Being picky about mayo is inconvenient. Wanting a specific brand in a specific size (read: not in Costco-esque restaurant quantity) means always making a special trip to buy it, running out or settling for second best. So I started making it. It’s not hard but here’s what I learned.

One batch is about enough to last us a summer week which is about how long you can store it for. I’d have to tinker with cutting back the recipe for the winter but in the summer we’re always making potato salad, BLT’s and just generally seem to go through it faster.

I like storing it in a jar like the one in the picture. It’s convenient, the glass is easy to clean and I feel like there’s less of a hurdle to everyone getting with the program of homemade mayo. It’s very much like using a regular old jar from the store.

Your oil (and probably your eggs too) should be at room temp when you start. I used to store canola oil in the fridge because we never use it. I tried to make mayo once using cold oil… I figured this one out the hard way.

I use Julia Child’s recipe from Julia and Jacques Cooking at Home. 2 egg yolks + 1 whole egg, 1 tbsp of lemon juice, 1 tsp of dijon mustard, salt and pepper. You whiz all of that together in the food processor and then slowly stream in a scant 2 cups of canola oil with the machine running. Once it starts to emulsify you can pour faster or hand it over to your assistant to finish up. If you don’t like to see the flecks of black pepper in your mayo use white but it doesn’t bother me. Then jar it up, pat yourself on the back and use it just as you would use your store-bought mayo.